The media objectives for the Dewmocracy video include the number of YouTube views for the company channel and increase the consumers’ interest in the product through and participatory and interactive campaign where the consumers get to taste test and choose the best flavors for Mountain Dew (MovieMiguel). Moreover, the campaign meant to establish more positive brand reputation emphasizing the consumer-centered approach to product development.
Content marketing strategies employed in the video include product reviews, interviews with the average consumers, testimonials, opinions, and transparency. Two more strategies that could have been used are facts and stats (the review of data collected from the other taste test teams to show which products lead) and visual data (some kind of visual demonstration of scores or a diagram as to the points the testers assign to each flavor along with their basic characteristics).
Since the campaign was implemented online via YouTube, it is important to measure the number of channel visits, and the views of campaign videos throughout its course. Moreover, another important assessment that needs to be conducted in the calculation of the investment return after the selected flavors were launched. These metrics would allow to measure the popularity of the campaign and its impact on the consumers.
Standard advertisement techniques that could be used in such campaign are the product and brand logo placement. The reach of the campaign is crucial as the more consumers review it and become aware of the taste testing, the more would be interested in purchasing the new flavors. The frequency of the campaign would increase its coverage and expose a larger portion of the customer base to the new product.
Agency
The marketing agency chosen for the review is called The Spark Group. This agency is based in New York City. Spark Group is a full-service agency, and this can be seen from its website that makes a direct statement. That way, The Spark Group calls itself a full-service digital agency (The Spark Group par. 1). The agency provides versatile services such as graphic design, branding, video production, search engine marketing, display advertisement, photography and retouching, influencer outreach, monitoring and analytics, email and mobile marketing, and independent consulting. The Spark Group has a website that contains full information about its team of professionals, functions, services, and the campaigns it has already completed.
The main point of difference of The Spark Group is the professionalism and experience. From the agency’s website one can see that this team has worked on multiple successful projects all of which are beautifully and tastefully done. The agency’s point of difference is made visible for the users of their website as the first view of the page presents the audience with the agency’s portfolio outlaying the clickable thumbnails of many of its projects for the potential customer to review and make sure that the agency is highly professional and has a large experience. That way, The Spark Group positions itself as one of the leaders in their industry segment. The agency employs a clever strategy using their projects as evidence. Choosing any of the services the agency provides and clicking on that section, the viewer receives a list of projects that match the chosen parameter. That way, The Spark Group markets itself using its work from the past as demonstrations and proofs of its professionalism instead of making empty claims and promises.
Brand
The brand selected for this analysis is Dove, one of the world’s leading manufacturers and marketers of personal care and beauty products such as soap, lotions, body wash, hair products, and deodorants for women and men.
The product objective of this brand is to promote its soap bars as the ones that provide the best care of the consumers’ skin as they include 25% of cleansing and moisturizing cream whereas the other products of similar kind tend to cause dryness of the skin accompanied with the feeling of discomfort. When it comes to the products of Dove, the presence of a gentle cream as an ingredient in the beauty and personal care products was emphasized as the main point of difference in its product-centered advertisements popular in the past.
The demonstration of the brand’s special care of the needs of its target audience is the focus on the new marketing campaigns of Dove that are made in a form of awareness raisers. For instance, one of the most recent and most popular campaigns of this kind was called Real Beauty Sketches – a video that became viral within the first weeks after release. The video can be recognized as consumer-centered but not product-centered because it does not feature any of Dove’s products or the brand name. Instead, the advertisement focuses on the modern women’s self-perception and bias that makes them unreasonable critical of their own appearance under the influence of the constant social pressure with its fixed and selective standards when it comes to beauty. As a result, the tactic of the product objective is to promote Dove products as different and more caring compared to the other lines whereas the tactic of the customer objective is to attract new buyers promoting the brand as socially responsible and driven by values nobler than the increase of revenues and sales.
Deceitful Advertisement
One of the most well-known deceitful advertisements and commercials that emerged last year were those created by Volkswagen. The series of commercials of VW vehicles claim that they are based on the “clean diesel” (Automobile Trends). The advertisement was placed on YouTube in April of 2015, and just a few months later the company was proved to cheat at the emission test using a defeating device in a form of software that recognized that the vehicles were undergoing a test and reduced the amount of emitted gasses (CO2 namely) (Hotten par. 1). The deceit in the advertisement is very clear as it is built around the proof that diesel engines can be clean and the belief that they may be dirty is false.
The difference between subjective and objective claims is in the perspective from which they are made. For instance, stating that the Empire State building is the tallest building in the world is an objective claim, its truthfulness may be tested by means of research and assessment. Subjective claims are made from an individual perspective. For example, one may claim that Mountain Dew is tastier than Sprite. Such claim cannot be tested as it is based on a personal perception of a particular individual. In the commercial, VW made an objective claim saying the diesel engines were clean, meaning that they are environmentally safe, which is false.
When the company faced the accusation of cheating, they admitted to it and started the investigation for the purpose to identify the group of individuals who developed and installed the cheating software. Several of the company’s leaders were fired over the first few months. I agree with the company’s choice not to fight accusations but accept them. I disagree with its claim that only a small group of people were involved in cheating as such massive change could not have occurred unnoticed by the authorities.
Works Cited
Automobile Trends. “Volkswagen Golf TDI Old Wives Clean Diesel Commercial.” Online video clip. YouTube. 2015. Web.
Hotten, Russell. Volkswagen: The scandal explained. 2015. Web.
MovieMiguel. “Distortion, White Out, Typhoon NEW Mountain Dew flavors Review Party DEWmocracy is Back!” Online video clip. YouTube. 2009. Web.
The Spark Group. The Spark Group. n. d. Web.